there are moments when both dogga and babycat seem to be on the same page. sweetly tuned in to our every emotion, they put aside their own agenda to curl up, their warm bodies tucked in against one or both of us, just being there.
in this time of necessary and vigilant waiting, as we defer to healthcare workers, scientists, the experts, all in their prodigious work, perhaps this is the most potent aid we can offer. to curl our warmth and any practical and safe help we can muster around each other. to acknowledge each other’s worry, each other’s fear, each other’s process. to be tuned in, to listen, to offer words of comfort. to stand with each other, hold each other’s hands, even from afar. to quietly just be there.
this morning i am devoid of color. like many of you, i had a day – for me it was yesterday – that shook me to the core. in the midst of all the bootstrap-pulling and the sisu-garnering we are mustering, angst pushed its way to the surface. i stood in front of my piano and it started. it didn’t stop until i laid my face on the pillow to rest, late last night, and then it woke me in the middle of the night, poking me into the place where you stare into the dark, imploring your mind to stop. if you were there too, in the middle of angst yesterday, we were in solidarity.
this morning i am devoid of color. apparently, for the whole of my life, i have not been as brutally aware of the chasms in this country as i am now. we are not really one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. and the rose-colored glasses that birthed loyalty have slid off our collective faces. this country is as divided as they come. it is as inequitable as they come. and woefully, it is as shallow as they come.
this morning i am devoid of color. in the middle of a global pandemic the leaders of this country are failing us. jousts of economic strategy are thrust into this health-terror; federal taunts of get-it-for-yourself set the stage, the precedent, a hideous example for a people intent on self-servingness. we see the curtain pulled on what is important to people and we are appalled.
this morning i am devoid of color. the in-fighting pales in comparison to the cavalier buttressing of parties. yes. “red and blue america are not experiencing the same pandemic.” we can’t have conversation because that would involve honest communicating. we can’t seek truth because who could then be blamed? we can’t even talk because we are too angrily disparate to talk. tilting my kitchen chair back on two legs as we read aloud the news i feel the earth tilt under me and i hold onto the table.
we are not on the same page, we of this country. this pandemic, capable of uniting us in working to flatten the curve of its dread, is further dividing us. information is warped; information is withheld. facts – facts! – are play-doh-molded into whatever pushes forth agenda. there are two distinct camps of thought and nary shall they meet. this has generated an opportunity, a ploy, for more polarity; we see it, experience it, up close and personal. and, to add insult to injury, the great divide, the vast difference between those-who-have and those-who-don’t is exposed like a compound fracture. despite sixty years on this earth, i have never seen it more clearly. and it is staggering.
this morning i am devoid of color. fear has drained the color from my face. i want us, my husband and i, to stay healthy. i desperately want my beloved children to stay healthy. i earnestly want my parents-in-law to stay healthy, our siblings, our families, our extended families, our friends. but the misinformation war has put us in peril. this insidious virus is sweeping the globe and we are in danger. that, at its root, should not be a question or a bargaining chip. it should not be ignored nor should it be conflated to suit agenda. it should be factual, pragmatic, cautious, proactive, seeking answers, results and healing of lives – indivisible – for all.
so many people in this nation, practicing goodness. but this nation? this nation has a choice to make.
this morning i am devoid of color. i am deeply disappointed. i am afraid.
this is an old woods. while we still can hike in it, we are driving -without stopping- to the woods and, generally without seeing anyone else, taking a hike. it is grounding to be in a woods that is old, a woods that is natural.
around us many trees have fallen. they lay quietly on the ground, nurselogs to others, the white rot fungi that is sharing their space an invitation to symbiosis.
we spend time looking up at the very-mature-trees standing, reaching to the sky, parallel to each other, taking in the sun. they too share their space. they have endured storm and wind, snow and torrential rain; they have endured times of thirst and times of excessive heat. they are still enduring.
i suspect most of these trees are much older than us. their rings of life could tell stories of lack, stories of abundance, stories of challenge and stories of ease. yet, they quietly stand, swaying in the wind like cattails along the curves of a slow river. not one boasts of its steadfastness; not one complains of its fall. the wisdom of the ages seemingly is in the long story. not in the angrily staccato-ed punctuation of a self-indulgent-short-story.
we step into the forest and the community of trees seems to sigh, pleased to see us again. it is not the prettiest of woods. but it is deeply, silently reassuring. life goes on.
chaos (physics): ‘behavior so unpredictable as to appear random, owing to great sensitivity to small changes in conditions’
we were at a meeting up north this summer when mona said this, “even chaos has boundaries.” i jotted it down because it felt relevant. in the midst of a contentious situation we were trying to keep our ‘do what’s best for the organization’ hats on, trying to believe that there, indeed, would be an end to the chaos. committed to a peaceful forward-advancing plan, we kept both hands on the hats, guarding against a wave, a treacherous wave of onto-the-band-wagon-jumping, the aligning of two camps on different shores offering nothing of good import for the organization.
but there is a fine, fine line. an infinitesimal line of crossover – where one tiny change, one more jenga block, one more pick-up stick, one more stone in the cairn, tilts the seesaw and chaos reigns.
we face, today, a seesaw of the greatest sensitivity. like refraction, light passing through various mediums, the bend in light is dependent on the medium. the slightest change in density yields change.
clearly, we must be sensitive. the light we refract, our response, will determine what the next person has to work with. if we refract less light and more darkness, darkness will exist, will be pervasive. and darkness, in the way of chaos, sussing out change and a hole in the dam, will become exponential. where is critical mass, when the seesaw collapses, the cairn falls?
we must be sensitive. we must be responsible. we must respond in integrity, despite everything around us, despite the doubters, despite the rhetoric, despite the cavalierness, despite the political dogfight, despite the positioning of that ever-present caste ladder, doing what is best for each of us, for all of us. what i do affects you.
in our own worlds, for ourselves, for all, we can strive not to pull the wrong jenga block or move the wrong pick-up stick. choose your cairn-stones with care.
in these times. the emotional upheaval is exhausting. worry is the crux of insomnia. we measure every step, every decision. we look to each other for reassurance, for a fast-receding touch of normalcy. we feel…lost.
in these times. we remember other times we felt this way. other times of confusion and fear, of social responsibility and adherence to new rules, new realities. too many calamities to name, it seems. too many times…lost.
this little book Peri Winkle Rabbit Was Lost was the product of such a time, as david created it – a one-of-a-kind – in response for a call for a children’s book that addressed the tragic hurricane katrina, a book given to children that offered empathy for the plight in which they were standing, their lost.
we, as artists, do what we can to offer comfort, to bring a little solace, a moment of breathing, a slice of hope in darkness, a tiny map in lost-ness.
we, as people, look to the arts for a little solace, a moment of breathing, a slice of hope in darkness, a tiny map in lost-ness.
in these times. standing in the darkness with each of you. maybe together we will not feel as lost.
these napkins make me think of jen. it’s the reason we bought them. at every single gathering with jen and brad, jen, who is an amazing creator of festivity, sets out fun napkins. patterns and colors and images and phrases. not the 300-1-ply-approx 6″ square-white-napkins-in-plastic-wrap kind of napkins, but napkins you choose that have some panache. confident napkins. napkins with personality. napkins that celebrate.
i grew up with the other kind of napkins. my sweet momma bought the 1-ply-approx-6″ kind of napkins all my growing-up years. sometime in their retirement, beaky switched to vanity fair napkins, which are a bit more substantial and, in their substantiality, a bit fancier. any sweetly patterned napkins were reserved for special occasions, parties, holidays. because DNA is a powerful thing, our beaky passed all this down to me, and so, i haven’t yet reached the vanity-fair-napkin-stage.
we actually are cloth-napkin people. because tight-budgeting runs through my veins, we seek out two cloth napkins as souvenirs when we travel, instead of chachkies. we can tell you where all our cloth napkins are from and love to pick out which ones to use from the drawer in the dining room.
but there is something to these fun napkins that jen uses. in the basement where we keep party supplies are several packets of fun, patterned, imaged napkins. i’ve been saving them. for company, for special occasions, for a celebration.
the other day i took out a handful and put them on the kitchen table. the last couple of evenings, as we sit with a glass of wine, i have laid one at our spots. this little napkin instantly makes me happier. a simple napkin. our moments of sharing a glass of wine at the kitchen table have become moments of celebration.
so, in this time of waiting and uncertainty, i have decided, even though it will require much pushing-back-against-that-nagging-stingy-voice-in-my-head, that we will use all those napkins. i’ll go downstairs and get all the fun jen-napkins we have, no matter the season to which they are dedicated. we’ll set them out and use them, making each time we are at the table together a celebration.
and i know my sweet momma, our beaky, will be smiling down at us. “wowee!” she’ll say.
i’m writing this as i listen to the loud interruption of wind machines and a large lawnmower/mulcher behind our yard. a family with many children (6 or maybe 7) is having their yard spring-cleaned up and it makes me nostalgic for the days we, as kids, as families, cleaned our own yards.
the feel of the rakes in our hands, the smell of leaves, the chill in the air and the anticipation of spring-on-its-way, the promise of hot chocolate. the quiet. i can hear the sound of the metal tines of the rake, many bent out of shape, as i attempted to make piles of leaves. my dad would later clean up my messy attempts but in the meanwhile i knew i was helping. i was outside and the sounds of birds-early-on-the-wing and rustling squirrels, the wind whispering high in the oaks of our yard, these were the sounds of march.
ahhh, the blowers and the large-engine machine just stopped for a moment and i took a deep breath before they started back up again.
in these days of unsettling and increasing isolation we are challenged to find ways to calm our souls. recently we took a long walk on the frozen lake up north. all around us nature was quietly waiting. gracefully bending in the cold wind, birch trees wait. grasses, browned from fall and a long winter, sway in pause. all around us you could feel it; anticipation of what is to come and the quiet biding of time.
in between all the remotely-done work-of-the-day tasks, maybe later today we will take a walk. we’ll put on our boots and drive to the woods. we’ll feel our breathing even out as we step from little-baby-scion into a hushed space, a place of waiting. we’ll likely walk in silence.
there’s so much noise around us these days. angst and anger, concern and contention, rhetoric and reason, pomposity and push-back.
we have no choice but to wait. to be respectful of each other, of the time it will take. to do what we need to do in order to survive as best we can with as few dire repercussions as possible. to be responsible and proactive. to do the right thing and honor health and life in the none-too-steady heartbeat of the world. to wait. like the birch trees and the grasses on the edge of the lake, bowing to the wind and rising to the sun.
it is at that place in my memory where i can juuuust-about-touch-it-but-not-quite – the first time i heard, ‘ don’t stare into the rearview mirror. that’s not the direction you are going.’ i can’t quite remember when or where i first heard it, but it was one of those comments that i stored away as a wisdom to feed off, something that would give me strength in a moment of weak, something that would give me hope in a moment of despair.
my john glenn high school senior class song was seals and crofts’‘we may never pass this way again’. even if it’s the best. even if it’s the worst. never. this moment won’t be repeated and, with the absence of time travel, we cannot re-live it. ever.
we have all walked in different shoes on different paths. we have passed through challenges of which we may never speak; we have had successes about which we have never bragged. we have been hurt; we have hurt. and we have healed.
“healing does not mean going back to the way things were before…” (ram dass)
the thing about healing is what it teaches us. we can never be un-hurt. we can never undo what was done or what we did. we can’t return to the baseline; it has vanished with the winds of change. in a million tiny pieces of glitter, it’s in that proverbial rearview mirror.
but we can ride the river of our breathing into new normal. we can carry with us learnings and soft words of apology. we can pack our virtual baggage with tools of prevention and fairness and forethought. we can pick up techniques of negotiation and navigating in the process of coming-out-of-pain. we can avoid the temptation to retreat from moving forward, thinking that healing means it’s all back to what it ‘was’ before.
instead, we can step, in blind faith, into next, trusting that healing will bring us to a new place, a new start. that healing will have somehow gifted us, given grace to all involved in ways we may never know or understand. that healing will be like dawn, like rain, like birth.
bananas. they were $.49 lb. we picked up a bunch and walked to the register. a moment later, with no question or drama, we paid our $1.17 and left.
the next step in my two-broken-wrists saga is occupational therapy. not because we do everything with our hands. not because we write with them and open doors with them. not because we use them for our personal hygiene or because we cook with them. not because we drive with them or dress with them or shake hands with them. but because using my hands IS what i do. the therapist asked me how long i have played the piano. 53 years. it’s what i DO. so getting my wrists back to pre-snowboard-fall is imperative to me. there are no other options.
before we went to this first appointment i, responsibly, called our healthcare insurance company – the one we pay $29,000 a year to – the one with the slogan ” for the care you need at a price you can afford” – to check in about the coverage of OT. i was told, after much menu-choosing, that i am limited to 20 visits and that the cost will be $50 per visit. with the OT’s recommendation that my getting-these-wrists-back-trajectory would involve appointments twice a week, that would add $400 to the already-$2400/month in healthcare costs. bracing. impossible.
the OT office checked in with me to remind me of my appointment, coincidentally, just after i hung up with the insurance company. i told them what i had just learned and they insisted i was wrong. “no,” i was told, “we have never heard of molina charging ANYthing for a copay.” I asked them to please double-check for me and they assured me they would and that they would apprise me at my appointment.
when i arrived, the receptionist checking me in told me that they had their 23-year-insurance-veteran in the office check and that there would be no copay. i asked them to provide a written document to that effect so that if and when i was billed i would have recourse. they assured me that they would triple-check and to stop back after my appointment.
at the end of my appointment with the therapist, the receptionist told me that “no, you don’t have to pay $50 per visit. it’s actually worse. instead, you have to pay 100% of all fees until your thousands-of-dollars-deductible is met.” what?!!!! now this is the third story i am hearing about the same service with the same provider and the same insurance company. who am i to believe?
i stood there and literally cried in front of the receptionist in the middle of the waiting area. you mean to tell me that our $29,000 a year doesn’t really cover much of anything??? this is blatantly wrong, grossly outrageous.
bernie sanders, if you have listened to him speak, has given a example of the perverted and pathetic healthcare in this country. he speaks about a family who makes $60,000 a year and that this family must pay $12,000 for healthcare. “that’s 20% of their gross income,” he bellows. what i wish he would add is this next example: consider a couple who makes say $65,000 a year (this is the magic healthcare cliff for two people and only $5000 more than the previous example). that couple will pay anywhere between $24,000 and $29,000 for a policy that will still have high deductibles and yet (clearly) not actually have good coverage. i want to jump on the bernie-bellowing-band-wagon and yell, “that’s 45% of that couple’s income!!! what is wrong with that???? EVERYTHING!” how is it that we can live in this country, the richest country in the world, and have the worst healthcare for our populace? how is it right to set the populace up for financial disaster when they have to deal with the eventual health scare, injury, illness?? (on a side note, i won’t even beGIN to start talking about Covid-19, for i have nothing good to say about the administration’s handling, lack of information or truth, and unpreparedness for this pandemic that will truly test the resiliency of our country.)
when i could take a breath at the receptionist’s desk i asked, “what do these appointments cost?” how much is my professionalism worth to me, i am thinking. i earn my living playing the piano, i am thinking. i have fifteen albums of piano music, i am thinking. i am a pianist, i am thinking. i just need care for my wrists so that i can do what i do, i am thinking. at what cost, i am thinking.
but healthcare is not like bananas. i was told, “we can’t answer that. we don’t know.” i beg your pardon??? “billing handles that. and it’s different depending upon insurance plans and whether or not you have appropriate insurance.” i beg your pardon???? “what if i just wanted to pay cash right now?” i ask. “you can’t,” she says. “we don’t know what it costs.”
i wonder if it would be more if i paid cash – after all, i’m not an overstuffed insurance company that has the capacity to deny portions of the billing or disallow costs or base payment on the coding used to describe my treatment, while at the same time accepting ridiculously high premiums from clients with the knowledge that the insurance offered is incomprehensibly lacking.
no. i’m just a person who needs her hands.
we left, went to the store and bought more bananas.
blind faith. every day. dare i say that is the way we live?
live (verb): to be alive or have life. we rise, we go about our day, never really certain what or who will cross our path, never absolute about any single thing we might encounter or be challenged by or be gifted with. we make plans, we have hopes, we dream of freely checking off that which is on our list-of-things-to-do and our bucket list.
in this moment now, we cannot see the moment of the past or the moment of the future, but we know that they are there; they exist. there is much we cannot see. words that elicit emotional response but nothing you can see as a thing with your eyes – love, grace, forgiveness, freedom. you can see evidence of them but not an actual thing, like the simplicity of a table or a chair. faith is one of those amorphous things. present as a gentle reassurance, zealous as a fire in your heart. you can no sooner lasso faith as you can lasso love. both are omnipotent; both are invincible.
“well i will walk by faith, even when i cannot see.”(walk by faith – jeremy camp)
and so we keep walking, never really knowing anything for sure. we trust. we trust the next day will come. we trust we understand these words that capture that which we cannot see; we embrace them. we trust we have life and that #allwillbewell.
but it suggests giving over to something bigger than us. it suggests belief in a universe where we are aligned with each of the stars in the milky way, where we are equally important – each of us, where we are held and richly loved and granted grace and forgiveness. where we lay our heads down to sleep and rest, believing, blindly, that next will come with the sun.
none of it is easy – our lives are not pre-scripted for ease. but we have been gifted with big hearts, thinking minds and the ability to keep on, despite all of life’s ambiguity.
my sweet momma loved these words, “breathe in faith. exhale fear.” no real proof. unless of course you count all those around you who love you, who have loved you and who will love you. the grace you have been granted with each day. that new day that comes.
“none of us knows what might happen even the next minute, yet still we go forward. because we trust. because we have faith.” (paulo coelho)
sometimes it takes a little practice. one foot in front of the other. stepping lightly.
reverse threading 